From a Seed of Lies
by demonprosecutor
Summary: "Many, many years he had stood in a corner in his mind, wearing a pink jumper and asking Dolly why." Phoenix looks for answers. Spoilers for T Phoenix/Iris; oneshot.


The prison's visiting room was very different to the detention centre. Tables were dotted around the room, at which sat anxious parents and boyfriends with dark circles under their eyes. Among all the people, Phoenix felt strangely more along than he did in the isolated detention centre. Maybe it was the absence of Maya. Maybe it was the absence of hope – an unfixed verdict. Maybe they were the same thing.

The sharp voice of a guard snapped Nick out of his thoughts. He tried to collect himself as the convicts entered the room, peering around for their visitors. She looked so out of place, and so unlike herself. Her face was pale and she had lost an alarming amount of weight. But when she caught Phoenix's eye, she smiled, and there she was. There, in that smile, was Iris.

"How are you holding up?" he asked as she sat down. He tried to smile back and look brave, but he knew she could see the panic and exhaustion in his eyes.

"Oh, I'm alright. How is Sister Bikini? And Mystic Maya? And Mystic Pearl?"

How typical of Iris to be thinking of everyone else but herself, he thought with a chuckle.

"They're just fine. Maya's getting into her role as the new Kurain Master, and Pearls is at Hazakura with Bikini. They're taking good care of one another."

"Thank goodness Sister Bikini isn't on her own," Iris said with a sigh of relief. "I was so afraid for her – she would struggle on her own." She paused before adding: "And – Mr Godot?"

"I don't know," Phoenix replied hesitantly. "I haven't checked up. I'm sure he's alright."

Here the conversation, and Phoenix's throat, dried up. A few timid smiles were passed across the table and Iris' eyes seemed transfixed by a mark on the laminate floor. Phoenix racked his brain for things to talk about.

"Crazy weather this month, hey?"

"Oh – um, yes. I haven't been outside much."

Of course she hasn't. She's in prison. Seriously, Phoenix?

"I saw this really funny picture on the internet yester –"

"Phoenix, I'm sorry."

He was surprised by the interruption (and slightly relieved, as the picture hadn't been that funny). Iris looked equally taken aback. She hadn't planned out what to say, and most likely felt embarrassed at having disrupted another person's story. Phoenix gave a warm smile and a nod, motioning for her to continue.

"I lied to you, so many times. In this past trial and – and in college."

Phoenix opened his mouth to comfort her but something held him back. His throat tightened and the air felt heavy about him. He couldn't add any more deceit to the Hawthorne web.

"Yes. You did lie."

Iris held Phoenix's gaze. He wanted to look away, but she was being strong, and he was going to match her.

"And – and it's not enough." He wasn't sure where he was going with that sentence. He didn't want to think about it, and he didn't want to know her response. It couldn't be good. Nonetheless, she nodded understandingly.

"It isn't enough," she said quietly, "to say it was all Dahlia."

Phoenix remained quiet, his stare fixed on Iris. He had run through this conversation in his mind many times but now it was all falling out of his head. His responses melted away and he could do nothing but sit in silence.

"It isn't enough," Iris continued, "to call on idolisation and manipulation. I knew who and what she was. I was the only one who could cut down her web of lies, but instead I helped her spin."

"Iris –"

"But Phoenix." She gripped the table edge, panic brushing over her face. "It wasn't all lies. Back then."

Phoenix held her gaze for a few moments more before he had to look away. It had made him feel selfish, how much his mind had drifted back to those particular lies when lives were being lost all around him. _I love you, Feenie _was surely little more than a petal on the breeze in the hellfire Dahlia Hawthorne had summoned, but it was still the voice that sounded the loudest in his dreams.

"We were just teenagers," he said flatly. "It didn't matter."

He didn't mean it, of course. It mattered and hadn't stopped mattering across the wide expanse of years. Seeing the expression on Iris' face made him regret saying it even more – but isn't that what he'd been aiming for? Just to see it, for a moment, in her eyes as he'd seen it in his own again and again. But as soon as he'd done it, he realised how unfair that was. He had lost his Dolly that day, but Iris had lost a sister, her only link to her roots and to the world outside Hazakura – and him, perhaps. Not to mention, while Phoenix's life had taken startling twists and turns since that incident, Iris' had been preserved in ice up in a cold mountain retreat. Maybe for her the wounds were less healed.

"I'm sorry, Iris," Phoenix said, more softly. "I didn't mean that. It was petty."

"N-No. You're right." She was blushing, and her voice was little more than a whisper now. "It was – long ago. But I was never able to apologise. I lied, even about my own name. I was so glad when you began to call me Dolly – Dahlia was somebody else."

Phoenix gulped and nodded. He felt hot and faint, and distanced from the physical world – his eyesight and hearing seemed to be backing out under the pressure of the conversation. Many, many years he had stood in a corner in his mind, wearing a pink jumper and asking Dolly why. Being here now and hearing these lilting answers was almost painful.

"Feenie." Iris strained to get the words out. "From a seed of lies – can a true flower grow?"

Now he was staring at his hands. He hadn't prepared for this. Memories, some real and some false, rushed around his head, and all the bridges that linked them had been burned.

"Dolly wasn't real."

At his words, Iris turned her face away. Phoenix wasn't sure if that was a tear in her eye. Her hands were together on the table and she was fidgeting with them nervously.

"But Iris was."

She didn't turn back to look at him, but her eyes widened. The blush, made all the more noticeable by the paleness of her face, grew darker, and her hands became still.

"And I need to rearrange my version of the past. Which means rearranging myself – all I knew, and all I believed in, and all I was, I built on what I thought my history was. It turns out now I didn't even know my own story."

Iris nodded slowly.

"And when I remember yesterday more clearly," Phoenix continued, "then perhaps I can turn to today."

Again, Iris nodded, still staring at her hands. Phoenix opened his mouth to speak but found himself exhausted of words. Instead, he reached his own hand across the table to gently rest it on hers. Finally, she looked up at him.

"Feenie –"

Once again, the guard's raucous voice flooded over the babble of conversation in the room, breaking up the little clusters of friends and family. Visiting hours were over.

"I'll come again as soon as I can," said Phoenix hurriedly as they stood up. Iris did not speak, but gave only a warm smile in response. They broke hands as she was ushered away, leaving Phoenix by himself to straighten out yesterday in his mind – and now, unexpectedly, to think also about tomorrow.


End file.
